Free The Brethren by John Grisham Page A

tired of banking and tired of Iowa and tired of snow and tired of his wife, and what Quince wanted more than anything that morning in February was a letter from his beloved Ricky. A nice, brief little note confirming their rendezvous.
    What Quince really wanted was three warm days on a love boat with Ricky. He might never come back.
    Bakers had eighteen thousand people, so the central post office on Main was usually busy. And there was always a different clerk behind the counter. That’s how he’d rented the box—he’d waited until a new postal worker was on duty. CMT Investments was the official lessee. He went straight to the box, around a corner to a wall with a hundred others.
    There were three letters, and as he snatched them and stuffed them in his coat pocket his heart froze as he saw that one was from Ricky. He hurried onto Main, and minutes later entered his bank, at exactly10 A.M. His father had been there for four hours, but they had long since stopped bickering over Quince’s work schedule. As always, he stopped at his secretary’s desk to hurriedly remove his gloves as if important matters were waiting. She handed him his mail, his two phone messages, and reminded him that he had lunch in two hours with a local real estate agent.
    He locked his door behind him, flung his gloves one way and his coat the other, and ripped open the letter from Ricky. He sat on his sofa and put on his reading glasses, breathing heavily not from the walk but from anticipation. He was on the verge of arousal when he started reading.
    The words hit like bullets. After the second paragraph, he emitted a strange, painful “Awwww.” Then a couple of “Oh my gods.” Then a low, hissing “Sonofabitch.”
    Quiet, he told himself, the secretary is always listening. The first reading brought shock, the second disbelief. Reality began settling in with the third reading, and Quince’s lip started to quiver. Don’t cry, dammit, he told himself.
    He threw the letter on the floor and paced around his desk, ignoring as best he could the cheerful faces of his wife and children. Twenty years’ worth of class photos and family portraits were lined along his credenza, just under the window. He looked out and watched the snow, now heavier and accumulating on the sidewalks. God how he hated Bakers, Iowa. He’d thought he might leave and escape to the beach, where he could frolic with a handsome young pal and maybe never come home.
    Now he would leave under different circumstances.
    It was a joke, a hoax, he told himself, but he instantly knew better. The scam was too tight. The punch line was too perfect. He’d been set up by a professional.
    All his life he’d fought his desires. Somehow he’d finally found the nerve to crack the closet door, and now he got shot between the eyes by a con man. Stupid, stupid, stupid. How could this be so difficult?
    Random thoughts hit from every direction as he watched the snow. Suicide was the easy answer, but his doctor was gone and he really didn’t want to die. At least not at the moment. He wasn’t sure where he’d find a hundred thousand bucks he could send off without raising suspicions. The old bastard next door paid him a pittance and kept his thumb on every dime. His wife insisted on balancing their checkbook. There was some money in mutuals, but he couldn’t move it without her knowing. The life of a rich banker in Bakers, Iowa, meant a title and a Mercedes and a large mortgaged house and a wife with social activities. Oh how he wanted to escape!
    He’d go to Florida anyway, and track the letter somehow, and confront this con man, expose his extortion attempt, find some justice. He, Quince Garbe, had done nothing wrong. Surely a crime was being perpetrated here. Perhaps he could hire an investigator, and maybe a lawyer, and they’d protect him. They’d get to the bottom of this scam.
    Even if he found the money, and wired it as instructed, the gate would be opened and Ricky,whoever in